Review Blog

Nov 13 2014

The soldier's gift by Tony Palmer

Jane Tanner. Penguin, 2014. Hbk ISBN 9780670077571. Ebk ISBN
9781743482131
(Age: Yr 5+) There is always work to be done on Hillside Farm -
except on Sundays. Sundays are a day of rest and, on this prophetic
Sunday, Tom takes his younger sister Emily to a special place high
on a ridge overlooking the land below. On it is a lone cypress tree
planted by their mother as a tiny seed many years before they were
born. Now it is her memorial.
All is not idyllic on Hillside Farm though. It is 1915 and each week
the postman brings the newspapers which Emily reads and when Uncle
Francis comes to visit, she hears him talking to her dad about the
war and the young local men who are dead, missing or wounded. But
Emily is hardly concerned for it is on the other side of the world.
However, when Uncle Francis suggests that Tom might be branded a
coward if he doesn't enlist, it comes to her peaceful home and sets
in train events that seem inexorable. 'Everyone else is going' does
not seem a good reason to Emily when it becomes clear Tom is going
to enlist, and as he sets out, standing so straight and tall and
looking so grown-up in his uniform, not even his promise to write
can stop Emily's tears flowing.
Tom does write - funny, serious, and sad letters. In one he sends
Emily some seeds given to him by another soldier 'from a pine tree
here in Turkey'. But no more letters follow and when Emily's father
finally gets the telegram he has been expecting, it has a
devastating effect. Emily runs to her mother's tree and just sits,
not even noticing her dad coming to get her and carrying her home.
That night, in a massive storm, the tree is destroyed. Emily's
father withdraws into himself, wearing his grief like a heavy
overcoat and Emily cannot reach him. But one day she shows Uncle
Francis the seeds Tom had sent and he persuades her to plant them
and nurture them...
This is a most sensitive story that has the events at Gallipoli as
its backdrop, not its focus. While our students learn about the
events at Gallipoli and appreciate them, it is difficult for them to
connect with what life was like at that time in Australia. It's like
they have an episode in time captured in a bottle without reference
or links to anything beyond those historical facts. A soldier's gift
helps them connect to life at the time by showing that it was just
ordinary young men who were at the heart of this conflict, young men
with families at home but a sense of duty to King and country
calling them louder. It shows the despair and hopelessness and grief
that families suffered when the longed-for letters stopped coming,
families grieving then at the loss of their loved one just as
families grieve now. But Emily's planting of the seeds, their growth
into seedlings and their need for protection which finally draws her
father forward is symbolic of planting and nurturing hope for an
enduring peace. Just as Tom's trees fight the odds for survival, so
might the world. In his gift is more than a handful of seeds that
look like dried moths.
Jane Tanner's illustrations are superb in helping to make those
connections. In muted tones that suggest both the mood and the
times, they provide exquisite detail of the period, particularly
those featuring the interior of the house, but also the calm,
carefree lifestyle as chooks scratch in the garden and dog Roo runs
free. This 'ordinariness' is highlighted by the illustrations on the
endpapers - sketches of family photographs, marriage certificates and
magazine covers but ominously interspersed with reminders that there
is a war being fought and its fingers are stretching out to touch
all that is known and cherished.
On the final page following some notes about the war in Europe and
at home, Tony Palmer makes reference to the seeds from the Aleppo
Pine - the famous Lone Pine - that we know came back to Australia
and are now thriving trees at the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne
and the Australian War Memorial, and suggests that these might not
be the only ones that came back. Tom may have sent some too.
Given that it is not until students are in Year 9 - 14 or 15 - that
they formally study World War 1 in the Australian Curriculum history
strand, literature is the only way that most students can connect
with the events that changed Australia for ever and which will be
such a strong focus over the coming months as the centenary of World
War 1 and Australia's role within it are commemorated. A soldier's
gift should be an integral part of that story.
Barbara Braxton